Steam
by waikan
Summary: Soon after The Day of Dark Sun, Guru Pathik releases another legendary being from her icy tomb. ZukoKagome slight AangKatara Challenged by Kurama'sFoxyMiko.
1. The Secret of the Air Nomads

This is an Avatar: the Last Airbender/Inuyasha crossover, this is my first one and one of my favorite kinds to read. This is for Kurama'sFoxyMiko's challenge. Sorry it took so long, KFM; I revised it at least twice, so without any further adeu let the story begin!

Zuko/Kagome

Slight Aang/Katara

It was cool for early summer. The air was nippy with a smooth breeze. A dark skinned old man with bushy eyebrows and a matching good-sized beard squirmed. Something was amiss, that much Guru Pathik knew. That fact alone made it hard for him to concentrate. He sat in attempt-meditation on his favorite plateau.

He furrowed his eyebrows, making his wrinkled face crease with calm frustration. Sighing with defeat, Guru Pathik stood and stretched.

"Mew"

"Hmm?"

He took notice of a cat standing in the middle of the platform. To say it was strange was putting quite mildly. It was cream covered with black markings and large red eyes. It sat with its two tails curled around its feet.

Guru Patik stiffened.

A twin-tailed fire cat. A legendary creature from Fire Nation lore said to spit fire.

"Hello, little one," he asked hesitantly. "What are you doing here?"

"Mew," the response came. The two-tail skittled across the platform and melted into thin air.

Guru Pathik's jaw dropped and his eyes bulged. A moment later it appeared at the top of the steps going down the step hill. Not only was the cat a demon; it was a spirit as well.

Turning its head toward him, it looked at him, as if it was asking him to follow.

"You want me to follow?" Guru Pathik quirked an eyebrow. "Why should I? Cats are fickle. They only come to you when they want something. How do I know you won't –"

The twin-tail growled, arching its back and took off down the stairs.

Guru Patik tiredly sighed.

"Well, alright," he shrugged.

* * *

Where the apparition was taking him, he wasn't sure. He had never known that a passage way existed under the meditating Airbender statue in the ruins of the Eastern Air Temple. The air was damp and misty. Ancient, cruelly carved stairs winded down into the mountain. 

The cat paused to make sure that he was following.

"Where are you taking me?" Guru Patik questioned. There was a faint, bluish light starting to grow stronger around the bend. Old carvings covered the walls. These he recognized as the runes of the Air Nomads, he read:

"_The Miko is a balanced vessel of the four aspects of the soul (love, hope, miracles and valor) and yin and yang. Every five hundred years a girl is born into opposing elements, and it's this concept of yin and yang that founds the Miko Cycle. _

_Seven hundred years ago a Water Tribe priestess fell in love with a Fire Nation soldier outcast and in time a little girl was born… this girl was the last in line of the Miko Cycle…"_

Guru Pathik tried to decipher what the next text meant, but the defacing was so bad that all he got was:_ Fire, destroyed, exile, Air, and ice. _

The Guru squinted at the neko.

"Why have you brought me here?"

Cocking its head, the cat meowed and fled down to the light.

He tip-toed carefully on the slick rock floor and his hands guided him along the dewy walls. Soon he came across an open stone doorway. Though the mist was still thick he could see that two female air nomads at either side; the two inner in bowed in greeting, the two outer held up their hands in warning.

"What is this?" Guru Pathik said, finally peeking inside to see why the cat had led him here, of all places. Inside, the frigid air made his breath into little puffs of steam. Great icicles hung from the tall ceiling that penetrated the limestone floor, an icy maelstrom of a thick sea of grass-like frost licked the walls and filled much of the room. Among the chaos of eternal winter a great jagged spiral of frozen water collided with the upper limit. He took a humble step forward and almost slipped. The very ground was frozen water over rock! Getting a steady stance, he gingerly made his way to the great pillar of ice.

His rough old hands slid over the surface of the column to remove the layer of thin frost, and revealed more writing. He looked around.

The two-tail was nowhere to be seen.

This is where it wanted him to be. But why?

He scraped away more and more frost. There wasn't just writing under the ice. And the column wasn't solid.

It _**was**_ an _icy prison_.

There, in the ice it self, was a young woman in suspended animation. She was beautiful; she had long ebony tresses caught up in the water's still breeze; a blue crescent moon tattoo illuminated her forehead, and she had pale tanned skin. Her eyes were closed in deep sleep and her arms were crossed over her chest. She cast a spell of peace amid the silent noise of her chamber. She was dressed out of date in a blue cloth dress with violet trim and at her feet in a fetal position was the same two-tail that led him here.

He shifted his eyes to the writing on her tomb:

"_I breathe, yet I don't live._

_I speak and all hear me, _

_But rarely understand._

_I am for but I am one._

_What am I?"_

"A riddle? Why a riddle? What are you here for?" Guru Pathik's voice rose calmly. "Why on EARTH am I even here?!" With a huff he collected himself. Although this is a grand and spectacular discovery, he still had no idea why he was there.

Disappointed, he turned to leave.

_Drip._

A drop of water dripped on his head. He looked up. Everything was beginning to melt.

There was a great crack. He whirled to see the pillar begin to split. The ice in the room was melting; water was collecting, flooding the place.

"What? Earth? Earth is the answer?" he yelped before an immense explosion of bluish-white energy shattered everything.

When Guru Pathik awoke he saw the glimmering night sky. Sore, he grunted as he sat up. The blast had demolished the top of the mountain completely. What was that?

His answer lay several feet before him. The girl lay slumped on the wet packed dirt…

She was breathing.

(Thanks for all your support; I hoped you enjoyed my new story. Thanks especially to Kurama'sFoxyMiko for her challenge; I don't think I could have done this without you. Have a good Thanksgiving holiday, everyone!

Ciao!


	2. Destruction at Sunset: Strt of the Jrny

Sorry about the delay. I started this chapter earlier in the year and now I've overcome the writer's block. **My next update will be** of Through Hell and Death Come Love. I hope you enjoy.

Steam

Light shined in through her eyelids. She groaned and stretched as slowly opened her blue-grey eyes. She saw her cat, Kilala, curled up right in front of her face. They were in an enclosed, nearly demolished room whose outer walls were covered in ivy facing a rising sun.

She sat gradually up and rubbed her eyes. Then it hit her; where was she? She was in the cave; what had happened?

She felt a presence. With a fling of the arm she let fly a fury of small ice daggers from her fingertips.

"Akkk!"

She glanced at her target; she gulped and chuckled nervously.

She had pinned Guru Pathik to the wall.

Kagome winced.

"Sorry."

"No. Prob. Blem," he grunted.

"Here, let me help you down," she waved her hand. The ice daggers melted and let Guru Pathik loose from his clasp to the wall.

"So, you **are** a waterbender. What is your name, child?"

"My name's Kagome," she said.

"That name hails from the **Fire** Nation. You are **half**, correct?" Guru Pathik questioned as he lowered himself onto the floor to sit in front of his new guest.

"Yeah… I am," she mumbled, clearly quite hurt over such a blunt conclusion. The Guru noticed her pain.

"Now it is my turn to be sorry, Lady Kagome. I am Guru Pathik. I found you in that frozen chamber. I will no longer pry, but I will say this, I believe I found you for a reason. Recently, I have heard that the Avatar has been killed," he saw the shock on kagome's face, "I, however, know that this is not true. I believe that you must go help put a stop to this hundred year old war."

"What war? Who would want to kill Yangchen?"tears started to trickle down her cheeks.

The Guru knew at once that Kagome had no recollection of her entombment or the happenings of the outside world.

... it would be best if he took small, gradual steps to bring her up to date.

"Avatar Yangchen? S- she has been de- you've been in that ice pillar for over seven hundred years."

"What?"

"One hundred years ago Fire Lord Sozin launched an assault on the rest the world," Guru Pathik grew grim. "First, he attacked the airbenders," kagome's eyes went wide. "And now, there is hopefully only one left. Avatar Aang, the Last Airbender."

"So, there are no Air Nomads left?" the shock and disbelief very evident on her face. "How did he survive?"

"Just before the genocide, Avatar Aang ran away. I think it was because they wanted to send Aang to train away from his mentor (and good friend of mine) Monk Gyasto," Guru Pathik sighed. "He was then frozen for one hundred years. He missed everything…"

Kagome became solemn.

"What's going to happen now?"

"I do not know. However, I do know that the Earth Kingdom is already under Fire Nation control. The Capital, Ba Sing Se, fell not long ago and that the Water Tribe is all that stands in the way to their world domination."

Kagome looked downcast. Then, she glared at him in such determination that he nearly jumped.

"What can I do?"

He regained his composure.

"You must help stop this war, with or without the Avatar. But first," he grinned as he whipped two bowls of green liquid out from behind him, "would you like a bowl of onion and banana juice?"

"Your strong love for Avatar Yangchen has not been forgotten, Kagome. Bring her into your heart and you will find the Avatar."

"Thank you for everything, Guru Pathik." Kagome bowed. It was noon; the warm sun basked everything with its brilliance. They had gone down to the platform were the Guru gave them supplies.

"It is nothing, Kagome, I am always here to help," Guru Pathik reached into his clothes and gave Kagome a large water skin, "here, you will need this. It is a long way to catch up with the Avatar."

"Once again, thank you, Guru Pathik," Kagome bowed once more, this time in the Traditional Air Nomad style. "I don't know what I'd do without you."

"I am a Guru. It is my job," he laughed.

Kagome smiled and nodded. "Kilala!" she called.

"Merw," the two-tail replied, rushing over the bridge to her mistress. Kilala was engulfed in a tornado of fire, and when the tempest subsided, a large saber-toothed Kilala ferociously roared to the sky. Guru Pathik took a step back. Kagome leapt abroad her feline companion and the two took to the air; Kagome waving goodbye.

Guru Pathik waved farewell in return; quietly watching them leave and get smaller in the distance, until he could barely see the flames on Kilala's tails and feet.

"You know, I think I almost wet myself…" he smiled, quite wryly. 'The last Miko has returned to this world, and now I feel some depth of hope in my soul. Good luck, Lady Kagome. You will need it.'

They left the safety of the Eastern Air Temple far behind; flying above the crimson placid waves of a sunset at sea. To the northwest, the Earth Kingdom's shorelines were barely in view on the horizon.

Kilala growled.

"What is it?" Kagome asked. She looked ahead, and far above the ocean were four gigantic monsters, with sky bison-like heads with a great horn prodding foreword; made of black metal and endowed with the Fire Nation's ensign.

"What are those things?!" Kagome looked on in fright.

The behemoths were now splitting into two groups. Three going north and one headed south.

"I wonder where they're going?" she mumbled as lay down to hug Kilala's neck. "They're so big. I don't think I can stop all four of them. Oh, Kilala what do we do?"

Guru Pathik's words echoed in her mind.

"_I do not know. However, I do know that the Earth Kingdom is already under Fire Nation control. The Capital, Ba Sing Se, fell not long ago and that the Water Tribe is all that stands in the way to their world domination."_

She had to do something.

She sat up.

"Kilala, I've got to stop those flying ships. Stay away until I'm done." The cat nodded in agreement. "All right. Here I go."

And with that, Kagome dived off and landed in the water. Once she stopped sinking, she made herself slowly spin to the surface. Kagome burst out of the water and froze a platform for her feet; which she anchored to her ice float with ice. Now that she had stance, Kagome created a blanket of mist…

"Captain?" a Firebender soldier looking through the periscope in the Control room asked his superior officer, "what is that?"

The captain turned the periscope and glanced in it.

"Corporal, its just fog."

"Yeah, I know," he said, "but it wasn't there before. It just came out nowhere…"

Kagome stopped her bending; closing her eyes, she assumed a meditative pose and the mist stopped spreading.

Everything grew quiet.

Kagome went into action.

Without hesitation, she summoned two spiraling jets of water to cover her arms, lifting them to make two colossal tentacles…

_"Forbidden Waterbending Technique: The Kraken Formation," _eight more gigantic tentacles rose out of the sea to writhe independently on their own.

Two wrapped around the south-bound airship and ripped it in two.

Kagome sliced another one in half, causing a large explosion. The airships that remained turned to engage in conflict.

They had begun to drop bombs on her; trying to defend themselves.

"They can do that?!" Kagome yelled before relinquishing her Kraken to make an ice barrier. The bombs exploded causing ice and water to burst from the attack.

Steam and smoke rose from the waves as the captain examined the icky depths…

The water swelled a fiery red and a cyclone of fire burst out of the blue. The column rose up into the air and Kagome popped out the eye of her own storm. Kagome released the fire serpent, leaping into the air. She gathered a deep breath before she summoned up fistfuls of flames. The flare engulfed her hands and grew in size; becoming large demonic claws of fire.

"Talons of Fire!!" Kagome screamed. The fiery talons sliced through the metal of the monster's skin along the back lower side, up its spine and she cut off its grotesque head.

The monster screeched to a halt a proceeded to fall with its brethren into the night waters of the earth kingdom's sea. Kagome sprang from the metallic corpse and as her leap turned into a fall she caught in the air by her trusted fire neko companion, Kilala.

Looking back at the devastation she had caused, Kagome realized that one of the flying metal-boat monsters had indeed gotten away. One of the north bound monsters subtlety changed its course ninety degree to the west – toward the Fire nation.

Kagome stared regretfully at the west bound monster.

'One got away,' she thought to herself, 'I wonder what destruction it will bring?'

Kilala growled inquisitively, bringing the miko out of her melancholy stupor.

"We don't have time for slaying metal monsters, Kilala. We have to free Ba Sing Se… and the Earth Kingdom."

Kagome glared toward the setting sun, or more over, the Fire Nation.

'I will never forgive the Fire Nation for what they've done."

Ooh, looks like Kagome's angry. Will she take out her frustration on Ba Sing Se? Find out next time on **_Steam!_**

Special thanks to BFM for her unrivaled support.

Review!


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